The Afterparty‘s psychological thriller can’t fully master its tone
It's not quite funny enough, and not quite scary enough.
TV Reviews The Afterparty
One of the weirder problems with The Afterparty might be that it’s taking very funny people and then sticking them in not very funny situations. This isn’t to say that comedians can’t do drama—there are a million examples to the contrary—but that because The Afterparty isn’t actually a drama, you still get hints of how funny they are interspersed with the more serious stuff. While the drama in Brett’s Fast and the Furious-inspired episode was still ridiculous, the psychological thriller setting of the Chelsea episode allows for fewer winks at the camera, somehow.
There’s also an episode-long disconnect between the funny Chelsea, and the thriller Chelsea. Is there supposed to be this much whiplash between how she sees herself in her thriller, and how chill she seems the rest of the time? Aniq, Brett, and Yasper all seemed to be basically who they imagine themselves, but heightened, whereas Chelsea is actually pretty nice and friendly when she’s not peering wild-eyed around corners at what turns out to be definitely-not-a-murderer-Walt. But the whipsawing between genres means that you get constant glimpses of Ilana Glazer being very funny, before it’s taken away again. It’s a weird letdown each time, because it just reminds you of how much more you’d enjoy that show. Where it lands is a thriller that is only semi-satirical, a mishmash of tones that leaves Chelsea lurching from cowering in a bathroom from a tormentor to an earnest attempt to connect with Zoe in the hallway moments later. She also seems both scared by her anonymous threatening texts and somehow not scared enough? They’re seriously creepy, but she doesn’t ever really hesitate to go to either the reunion or the party. Is she on the edge of a breakdown thanks to these things, or just curious who’s spamming her?
The stalled conversation with Zoe is one of the biggest developments in the show’s growing universe of connections, as it’s part of the big reveal that Brett’s affair was with Chelsea. It doesn’t totally track that Chelsea would be into Brett? But it also doesn’t make any sense that Zoe was with him either, so we’re just going to have to accept that Brett has serious game until you actually get him in bed, at which point it devolves into very bad sex with an unexpected number of high fives. It’s a big shift in the dynamics between these characters, but it doesn’t exactly make it seem like Chelsea is teetering on the brink when she goes from trying to drug Xavier to a heartfelt apology to Zoe moments later. And despite her suggesting that Xavier and others made high school hell for her, she seems to be on pretty friendly terms with both Aniq and Yasper, who repeatedly goes out of his way to reassure her that she’s in charge of her own destiny.
That said, the episode still offers plenty to enjoy, with a few payoffs on baffling moments from earlier, such as why Chelsea is in the car with Yasper (standard friendly ride offer between friends) or why she and Brett are so tense around each other, or even why Xavier peed off the balcony (he was actually pouring out cat tranquilizers). It also offers the first glimpse of Xavier that isn’t filtered through the hatred of a jealous man, even if it still shows him through the filter of someone who hates him. He’s sort of a doofus, as you’d expect, even though the episode’s refusal to get into the particulars of his misdeeds at the St. Patrick’s day party takes some meaning out of Chelsea’s forgiveness of him. What, exactly, ruined her life for 15 years, yet was simultaneously mild enough to forgive over the course of one night? And more importantly, what did he do to Aniq?
Stray observations
- “One look at that guy and you’re like: This is a person who cannot handle their pet sedatives.”
- “Did you see her hair? It looks like she made out with a tornado.” “It’s just Jewish hair.” is one of the many examples of chill and funny Chelsea, even though it takes place within her thriller.
- “Who won here?” is a great question about sex with Brett, although it seems pretty clear that the general winner is him.
- I rewatched the pilot with some friends after writing the recap, and this show really does benefit from your ability to stitch together disparate threads from the pilot. Like Brett awkwardly yelling “I’ll kill ya” in Aniq’s drugged memory becomes “koala!” in Brett’s version of the tale. I was a little surprised we didn’t see what Chelsea heard in that interaction.
- Did anyone else predict that Chelsea’s X-marked flask was drugged? I had been wondering, since we’d already seen her react so strongly to Aniq drinking it, plus he sure seemed drugged.
- Solid payoff that Chelsea’s canceled revenge plan was a waste of time anyway, since Xavier has already leaked his nudes to the press.
- Possibly just coming at this from a lifetime of pet ownership, but why does Jennifer 2 not realize vets have receptionists? Who does she think checks the pets in while the vet is seeing patients? I have spent too much time thinking about her saying this, and now you have, too.
19 Comments
I think I am tapping out after the 3rd episode. After episode 2 had, what felt like 15 minutes of fight scenes that just dragged on, the musical numbers in episode 3 just felt like they were getting in the way of the story. The cast has so much talent, and when they are just kind of riffing about things you can see how this could work but then the “theme” of the episode comes up and seemingly kills the momentum that was building. I do have to say the 3 dots song did give me some legit laughs though and anything with Sam Richardson and Ben Schwartz will always be worth trying. I just wish this one stuck with me a little more.
This show would have really benefited from being binged. I really enjoyed the first three episodes because you could see the same interaction from three perspectives and their unintentional bias. But watching this episode, it’s been a week and I don’t remember a lot of the small details that I would probably enjoy if I binged it.I’m desperate to know who was texting Yasper/Chelsea and my best guess is it’s the Asian guy/Jennifer’s husband who was “Pranking” Aniq.
You know there’s nothing stopping you from waiting to watch until the finale?
yeah i think there’s gonna be a lot of ‘a ha!’ moments that are callbacks to other episodes that will fall flat. it’s also just like…not that good? it’s okay and obviously everyone is watchable, but after 4 episodes it’s just not really anything yet. i didn’t realize it would be quite this gimmicky.
Ms. Glazer looking more windswept than usual.
My pet theory is that Walt isn’t a classmate. He got his hands on a yearbook and that’s how he knows who people are. Maybe he was married to someone in the class who has passed away?
Yeah, something is definitely up with Walt but I’m sure it’s just to have him serve as a red herring.Its probably too early, but my guess is Yasper or Zoe killed Xavier.
Like Dwight taught us, it’s never the person you most suspect (Walt). It’s always the person you most medium suspect (Yasper).
But it’s at least 10 times better than Murderville.
I feel like this was the first episode that didnt reference Quiet Heather or whatever having sex with their old teacher.
The best thing this series has done is confirm Kathleen Kennedy did the right thing regarding Solo: A Star Wars Story.
Seriously, though, I love this show’s cast, but the writing is not great, and the direction is equally not great. None of the show’s genre switches have been that good or that accurate.
Yeah, but, like, Ilana Glazer is still wildly attractive and funny, so who cares?
I agree with Mr Mud below that, as much as I rarely like the binge model for TV, this show would benefit from it. This episode was the weakest for me (despite starring one of my fave cast members) and I think *part* of the reason for that is due to the break between episodes. But I do agree that in general the horror/slasher aspect could have been bumped to more ridiculous heights (also was this the first episode without a cameo from that teacher sleeping with “Quiet Heather”? Why create a running gag and drop it—or maybe I missed it).
That said, I don’t agree with this: “There’s also an episode-long disconnect between the funny Chelsea, and
the thriller Chelsea. Is there supposed to be this much whiplash between
how she sees herself in her thriller, and how chill she seems the rest
of the time? Aniq, Brett, and Yasper all seemed to be basically who they
imagine themselves, but heightened, whereas Chelsea is actually pretty
nice and friendly when she’s not peering wild-eyed around corners at
what turns out to be definitely-not-a-murderer-Walt”
That made complete sense to me—remember in this case we learned that Chelsea was *putting on an act* and purposefully trying to come off as “crazy”/incredibly drunk, because of her revenge plot (I’m not quite sure why that would play into the revenge plot, but it is made clear why there is such a disconnect between the two Chelseas).
Well if it wasn’t obvious by the episode’s final moments, it seems next week will be a flashback to the party (and I guess the genre is “high school party?”) The opening credits (which I love) seem to be going through each genre in the order we get them (other reviews have already mentioned an animated episode, which I assume is where the opening credit images of a flip-book type bear chasing a woman come from…) and after the horror part of the credits we have a building with people partying in it.
“Is there supposed to be this much whiplash between how she sees herself in her thriller, and how chill she seems the rest of the time?”Yes. That’s literally the point of the format.
Exactly! Every episode comes from the perspective of an unreliable narrator. I don’t know why she can’t seem to grasp this concept.
Likely the result of most of the writers being forced out. Is it so hard to get a writer to pay attention to the show they are reviewing?I rewatched the pilot with some friends after writing the recap, and this show really does benefit from your ability to stitch together disparate threads from the pilot. Like Brett awkwardly yelling “I’ll kill ya” in Aniq’s drugged memory becomes “koala!” in Brett’s version of the tale. I was a little surprised we didn’t see what Chelsea heard in that interaction. Did anyone else predict that Chelsea’s X-marked flask was drugged? I had been wondering, since we’d already seen her react so strongly to Aniq drinking it, plus he sure seemed drugged.SMH
It also offers the first glimpse of Xavier that isn’t filtered through the hatred of a jealous man.Did you miss the last episode? There’s no review for it, so I guess you did?
Yasper was a jealous man, though–just jealous of Xavier’s success rather than his flirtation with Zoe.
Aniq, Brett, and Yasper all seemed to be basically who they imagine themselves, but heightened, whereas Chelsea is actually pretty nice and friendly when she’s not peering wild-eyed around corners at what turns out to be definitely-not-a-murderer-Walt.We’re dealing with unreliable narrators here and the key part of your comment is that they are imagining these versions of themselves. Chelsea imagines herself to be level-headed, rational, and friendly, but she’s obviously perceived by others as being a little off her rocker. Chelsea’s interaction with Zoe may have seemed heartfelt and sincere in her version of events, but we haven’t seen it from Zoe’s perspective yet. Like my mom always said, crazy people don’t know they’re crazy.